FAMILY PARTICIPATION IN SCHOOL

Abstract

This paper is a reflection on governmental programs that encourage school-family partnership in public elementary schools in order to improve the quality of their educational practices. The History of Brazilian Education has shown that similar proposals have been occasionally submitted to schools, even though their objectives have not been reached. We based our reflections, among other hygienistic ideas, on the program which aimed at debating the hygienization of all kinds of Brazilian problems (physical, social, pedagogical, and moral) at the beginning of the twentieth century. In spite of their mentors’ efforts, such activities did not take into consideration social contradictions that led to most difficulties faced by schools; thus, they are seen by History as “one more program” whose results were unsatisfactory at the beginning of the twentieth century. The same happens at the beginning of the twenty first century.